


Hours Long and Short

by shinyopals



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Fosterson Week, Jane Foster Loves Science, POV Thor, Post-Thor: The Dark World, Thor Is Not Stupid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-12-03 11:32:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11531346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinyopals/pseuds/shinyopals
Summary: The first night, Thor does not sleep.(Written for a post-TDW prompt for Fosterson Week 2017.)





	Hours Long and Short

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [Niobium](http://archiveofourown.org/users/niobium) for putting up with my nonsense and beta-reading!

The first night, Thor does not sleep.

He’d forgotten the speed at which Midgard spins - what feels like one hour for him runs to three on this realm - and before he knows it, it’s dark and he’s alone in his small, borrowed bedroom on his small, borrowed bed. Jane sleeps in her own rooms, scant distance away and yet at the same time so far. The house is quiet, but not quiet enough. Despite the cold outside temperature, he’s opened the single solid glass window in the room, and he appreciates the breeze but the noises of the alien city outside filter through, unmuffled by any shielding. There are motor carriages on the road, carousing locals, and even, occasionally, strange, distant sirens that seem to rouse no one but himself. He does not need silence to sleep, but he is unused to the noises of Midgard.

Alone in his room, he realises more and more that there is much he has not considered about relocating to another realm. Once he knew Midgard well. He spent time in his youth amongst its peoples, joining their battles and exploration and trading, as one of their gods perhaps, but as a friend and ally too. A thousand of their years later and he has more to learn than he’d ever imagined. His mother would say-

He tosses in his bed, quelling thoughts which rise unbidden. Far better to think instead of the future, of Jane.

She’d kissed him on the balcony that morning, and asked him to stay. He’d not dared dream she would, but he’d not dared dream otherwise. Without her, he has nowhere. But then she had anchored him to herself without a second thought, pulled him in like he pulls in a storm, and made her home his with just a few words. 

Then as always, they were interrupted, pulled apart by Darcy reminding them of neighbours watching. The rest of the short, Midgardian day had been filled with the practicalities of his arrival. He’d travelled light, as was his custom, not wishing to presume and intending instead to buy any goods required with precious gemstones he’d brought to trade for their currency. It had not occurred to him that in a house without a staff - for whatever Darcy is, she is not a steward as he is used to it - the burden of this plan would fall to Jane. He had stumbled through an apology at his thoughtlessness, but Jane had smiled and taken him shopping. There, she had not only bought him clothes and other items, but she’d tolerated the questions he could not help but ask. Where were they? Who was their leader? Were they at peace? What was this food? Where did it come from? What was this device for? She did not know all of the answers and nor did he when she asked him of Asgard, of his last two years, of the Bifrost; but her bright smile as they talked had arrested him on more than one occasion.

Now though, she sleeps, and he does not. Scowling to himself, Thor fidgets. He has not slept well in some time. The wars he’d fought to bring peace to the realms had not rested easy upon his heart, and then Malekith’s fight...

Thor shakes his head and stands. If his mind will not be quieted, then he will not lie helpless. He pulls a robe over his sleeping clothes and gently opens the door to his bedroom. The house is lit only dimly by outside lights of the city and artificial coloured pinpoints from Jane’s electronic devices. Thor treads lightly over the carpeted floor towards one of the main rooms of the house where there are books. There he settles himself in one corner of the low, soft couch to read. The lamp by which he reads glows a soft orange, but unlike a flame it does not burn down or flicker and recall him to himself. Instead he turns page after page, allowing these new tales to wash over him, time passing without his notice.

~*~

‘ _Why did you kill me?_ ’ says his brother, blood pooling around his body.

Thor goes to object but there is Mjolnir and there is his brother’s blood. There is no light in Loki’s eyes and his skin is ashen.

He’s on Vanaheim. His friends are dead. Jane is here but he doesn’t know where. He has to find her. Sif lies still at his feet and he’s rooted to the spot. He must find Jane, but he cannot-

‘ _You’re a fool!_ ’ His mother is holding Mjolnir. ‘ _For your actions, I banish you to Asgard!_ ’

 _I must find Jane_ , he thinks, but cannot speak. He reaches for his mother, for Mjolnir-

‘Thor!’ He jerks upright. 

He is in London, on Midgard, and in front of him stands Jane. Like him she wears clothes for sleeping and a robe, her face free from make-up and her hair rumpled. She is beautiful, but he momentarily does not know how to say it, nor anything else. 

He realises that he’s summoned Mjolnir in his sleep, one arm outstretched, knuckles white. His breaths come jagged, like he’s been fighting for hours. He feels his face colouring and drops his gaze and his arm.

‘I am sorry, Jane, I did not mean to disturb you,’ he says. He should have stayed in his room. He should have stayed awake. He knew there was a chance-

‘You didn’t,’ says Jane absently. ‘Astronomer, remember?’ There is silence. Thor shifts in his seat. He should go to bed. He does not wish to stay longer than necessary, to prolong this. ‘Cocoa?’ asks Jane. It is only from her tone that he realises it’s a question for he does not know what she means.

‘What is that?’ he asks.

‘Oh, right, sorry,’ she says. ‘It’s a drink. It’s sweet. I- I like to have it when I can’t sleep.’

He raises his eyes to her once more and regards her. She is watching him steadily with, he thinks, a determination not to drop her gaze, and he cannot help but feel calmed. She does not hold his wandering mind against him. ‘I would like to try it, thank you,’ he says, with what he hopes is an even smile.

In the kitchen Jane heats milk on the rings atop the stove, then stirs in brown powder and sugar. Thor watches her actions with interest, focussing on her the same way she focusses on her task. She is, after all, alive. He has lost his mother and his brother but he has not lost her. She stirs the drink she makes with one hand, her other going to tuck stray hair behind one ear. She is worrying her lip and Thor thinks she is working her way up to speak. He has nothing he can bring himself to say, so he waits.

When first she does speak, it’s a ‘Here you go’ as she hands him his drink. ‘Careful, it’s hot,’ she adds. Thor takes a cautious sip anyway, and finds that it is not too hot for him. It is sweet and creamy and comforting, and he can see why she would drink it when she cannot find sleep.

‘Thank you, Jane,’ he says.

For a few minutes they drink in silence. Then Jane sucks in a breath, then lets it out, then does so again. ‘Would you- would you like me to ask?’ she says at last. He blinks at her. ‘About- back there. Or if you’d rather I can ask about whether you have ice cream on Asgard. Or how those floating boats work. Or what your favourite class was at school… if you even went to school. Do princes go to school? I don’t know if princes go to school. But we can talk about… whatever you want.’

Thor swallows a sudden lump in his throat. ‘Jane-’ he says, but he has to stop for he does not know what should come next. His mother and brother both deserve better than a man who cannot find the words.

Jane regards him in silence for a few moments more, then takes his hand. ‘Come on,’ she says.

She leads him to her bedroom. Of all things he had not expected that. He has seen it, briefly, helping Jane fetch towels and linens for himself. It’s bigger than his own in that house, though far smaller than any of his rooms on Asgard, and the air is a little stuffy and warm. Jane’s instruments and papers follow her wherever she goes and her bedroom is no exception. Now she clears those very papers from small tables on either side of the bed and gestures for him to deposit the rest of his cocoa there and make himself comfortable on the bed. 

He follows her lead, leaning back against the headboard and pulling blankets atop his legs. Her room is warm. Too warm. She is there, though, and he would have nothing else. He teeters on the edge of a cliff, fearing that any wrong move might see him banished from her chambers for misinterpreting her meaning. He has slept beside her before, beneath the stars of Puente Antiguo, thinking of family he will never see again. Perhaps it is not so different now, for all that there is only one bed.

Jane rearranges herself, moving in, leaning into him, wrapping one arm behind his waist and even hooking one leg over his, nudging him with a cold foot as she does. ‘Hey,’ she says gently, ‘it’s OK to be upset you know. Or angry. Or whatever you want to feel. And you don’t have to talk if you don’t want to. I’m just… I’m here, OK?’

Thor swallows, then nods, and carefully settles his arms about her. He remembers hearing of a father she and Erik only ever speak of in the past tense and thinks that maybe she, more than anyone, understands. He tightens his hold slightly, before remembering she is of Midgard and loosening his grip. ‘Are you comfortable?’ he asks.

‘Mmm,’ she says. She nuzzles his neck and kisses his chin, which sends a warmth rippling through him that has nothing to do with the temperature of the room. ‘So,’ she says at last, ‘ _do_ you have ice cream on Asgard?’

~*~

They sleep little, talking in low voices about their worlds. Like that first night they spent together in the desert, but she lies in his arms rather than across from him, a comforting weight holding him to the realm. As time stretches further, she dozes on and off, leaving Thor to his thoughts, but with her there they are happier ones. In the morning, before she leaves to bathe (and he quietly returns to his own room with that same aim), she kisses him for a long time. Thor is only too happy with this, and holds onto her for as long as he can, bathing in the warmth of her smile when she pulls back.

‘I’ve gotta do some work today,’ she says before she goes, ‘but you can read more, or watch TV, or if you want to go see something of London we can show you some places you can get to on the tube.’

Thor thinks on this as he washes and dresses into his new Midgardian clothes. He has things he should do - get in touch with Stark to see about selling his gems to obtain funds so he is not dependent upon Jane, for one - and he is keen to explore the city, but his body still aches a little from his extended battles and he does not think some peaceful days will go amiss. He thinks he might stay around the house, if Jane does not mind his presence. There is much he can learn from her books and the internet, after all.

(Truthfully, he does not want to leave her yet, not even for a short amount of time. _Another day_ , he tells himself, and pushes down that thought.)

In the kitchen, waiting for Jane, he hunts down coffee and carefully replicates the steps he saw her take the previous day with the coffee machine. Most of what he needs is readily available, and he is able to grind the beans to what he hopes is the correct consistency. The paper dishes required by the machine take longer for him to find, and he sorts through cupboards with tins and packets and spices that he doesn’t recognise until he is successful.

He is just holding the paper dishes aloft (“filters” says the packet) when Jane appears. She wears an under-shirt with the letters “NASA” across a blue and red logo, with one of her check-patterned shirts unbuttoned over the top, and the dark blue pants she calls jeans. Her hair lies wet across her shoulders and she appears to not be wearing make-up once more. Thor smiles automatically. He has known too many people refuse to be themselves in an attempt to curry his favour - spending hours to look perfect and then holding their tongues in conversation - and here is Jane, who is nothing but herself and all the more wonderful for it. When she smiles back her eyes are bright. 

‘Oh, I would have done that!’ she says. 

‘It is no bother,’ he says.

‘Looks like you’ve got it figured out anyway,’ she says, then her smile widens. ‘Guess a guy who can pilot an alien spaceship after five seconds of button pressing can probably work a coffee machine.’

‘It is not the most complicated machine I have used, it is true,’ he says. For a moment they stand still, just smiling at each other. It seems so unlikely to him that he is even there, but it is hard to argue with Jane standing in front of him.

She joins him beside the machine as he finishes adding the ground beans to the filter, touching his arm as she does so. When he switches the machine on and turns to her, she kisses him again. He is happy to take her once more into his arms until the coffee is ready for them both.

They cook breakfast together, as they did that first morning two years before. He knows how to cook eggs and toast, but is unfamiliar with the cooking implements she uses, so is glad of her guidance. As they work in relative quiet, he lets his thoughts turn to kissing her, and then, almost unbidden, to other things beyond kissing...

He should not think like that, of course. He does not know how she feels. To kiss a woman and share her bed might be enough in some cultures to require a marriage, and in others might mean nothing. He thinks it is not nothing. He hopes it is not. He does not yet know. When he first visited Midgard, he and his friends - Fandral in particular - had once or twice made local chiefs and kings attempt to demand a marriage for far more chaste offenses than kissing; and had other times been received with open arms and encouraged to bed someone who clearly wished for a child born of the gods. (Aware of his position and certainly not desiring a child, Thor had been careful to avoid such dalliances.) Now though he does not know what Jane expects, how his actions might be read. 

As well, more than anything, this is _Jane_. She must not think this some casual, thoughtless action on his part. He must find out what her culture’s attitude is, though he has not the faintest idea how. The internet, possibly, although he does not know if Jane will be able to see what he reads when he’s using her borrowed devices and connection. He wonders who and how to ask.

It is Darcy who begins to help solve his problem, although she does not know it. She arrives late to Jane’s house, breezing in and helping herself to the last cup in the pot of coffee.

‘Sorry I’m late,’ she says. ‘London traffic is awful and I was up late having sex with Intern.’

Jane chokes on her food while Thor politely inspects the dregs in his coffee cup. Even Fandral is a more subtle, though not by much. Does Darcy expect a response from him or from Jane?

‘Shouldn’t you at least be calling him his name by now?’ says Jane. ‘I’m pretty sure you should be calling him his name by now.’

Thor looks up to see Darcy grin. ‘Whatever,’ she says. ‘He’s doing your data entry this morning. Having an intern is so great. Why didn’t I do this ages ago?’

‘The sex, or pushing off the data entry?’ asks Jane archly.

‘Both,’ says Darcy. ‘Mostly the data entry. I can get sex anywhere if I just-’ Here she pulls down her shirt and sticks forward her chest. Thor looks hurriedly at Jane for some guidance. 

Jane is looking at Darcy and shaking her head. ‘Are you two… dating now?’ she asks dubiously. 

‘I’m thinking about it,’ says Darcy. ‘I don’t know if I want a relationship, but I’ll probably sleep with him again. I can’t leave you two having all the fun.’

Jane coughs again, her cheeks suddenly turning an attractive pink colour. Thor steps to his feet to make more coffee, ignoring Darcy’s snickers. At least, he thinks, this implies that sex is a subject he may broach without causing offense. Though he certainly does not plan to do so around Darcy.

‘ _Anyway_ ,’ says Jane loudly. ‘I was hoping that today you can help me sort through these infrared images from the Convergence looking for anomalies.’

‘Sure thing, Boss,’ says Darcy. Her voice is cheerful. When Thor dares glance at her, she winks at him. 

He washes the breakfast things and sets them to dry, then takes a cup of coffee and the tablet computer Jane has lent him, and leaves them to their work. He has just shut the door behind him when he hears Darcy speak.

‘So… how was it?’ she asks Jane.

‘ _Darcy_!’ If Darcy’s question had been ambiguous, Jane’s reply makes it clear.

‘What? Actual alien god-man. I’m curious. I don’t think that’s weird.’

Thor hurries away from the door, wondering if perhaps Midgard has become a little _too_ open about such matters.

~*~

The day passes quickly and so when Thor looks up, the sun is already sinking towards the horizon. He has continued to read the book he started the previous night (it is about a recent period of time called the Cold War) as well as browsing websites about news and current events on the internet. Midgard’s politics are complicated and eventful and Thor finds himself fascinated (and at times a little horrified) as he delves deeper.

It is already dark outside when Jane finds him and asks if he would like to go out for a meal and a walk. They eat at an Italian restaurant, and Jane shows him Italy on a map and tells him about her visit to Bologna a few years before, where she attended a conference concerning her work. Erik spoke at the Conference and she describes his work on detecting stellar deaths and black holes. Thor is fascinated, despite that it is outside the realm of his usual interests.

‘Your people have come very far indeed,’ he says. ‘Did you speak at this event?’

‘Um, no,’ says Jane. She shifts slightly in her seat. ‘People didn’t really start to take my work seriously until after- well, New York.’

Thor frowns, pushing away the mention of Loki’s attack to focus on Jane. ‘But you knew the truth before then,’ he argues. ‘My arrival showed that your theories were right.’

‘Yeah, but SHIELD- they aren’t particularly big about sharing the whole aliens-invaded thing. They let me work for them, but I didn’t get to publish until I quit after everything that happened, and told them to go and- well, I told them some things.’

Thor grins. He has no argument with SHIELD but he enjoys seeing Jane roused to temper, an avenging fury defending herself and her work. ‘I should like to hear those things.’

Jane bites her lip. Thor wants to kiss it. ‘Yeah, well, not in public,’ she says with a slight smile. 

He laughs and takes her hand, then kisses her knuckles, before making his face serious. ‘I am sorry your world took so long to see your work for what it was,’ he says. ‘I have seen enough to realise that suppressing new discoveries is often a disservice to the realms.’

‘Yes! Exactly!’ she says, voice raising a little. ‘I mean, I get that aliens in New Mexico is like, not something the government wants to cop to, but wormhole travel? As in, for real confirmed wormholes between nine worlds? That’s incredible! This isn’t about me getting the credit - although a little recognition would be nice - this is about our entire planet moving to the next stage. Just imagine it!’

Thor smiles even as he feels a slight unease at her words. Midgard developing a Bridge of its own will cause complications. Asgard is used to control of the Bifrost. Too used to it, perhaps, and the other Realms look to them for guidance. To see Midgard with a similar power would discomfit many. His father will not be pleased. Thor can no more dampen Jane’s enthusiasm than he can bid her farewell, however, so instead he smiles and asks her if she has been to conferences that _have_ asked her to speak.

After their meal, they walk home slowly, taking a circuitous route. He tells her of visiting the region of Italy a thousand years before, to the island she calls Sicily. The food then was a little different to what he ate in the restaurant, he concedes, and she laughs and asks him about the people she calls ‘Vikings’. Jane is too short to easily walk with her arm in his, but instead she takes his hand as she has before. Her skin is cool compared to his, and her hand small, but it fits well in his and he is all too happy of the contact.

When they arrive back at her home, Thor hovers for a moment. He has his own room, of course. He does not wish to go there, not alone, but it seems to soon to invite himself into hers, even only to rest or to talk more. She puts away her coat and tidies absent-mindedly, barely looking at her papers as she shuffles them. It is some comfort when he realises that she too is unsure. He walks to her, pulls her into his side and kisses her, and she wraps her arms around him, one hand running through his hair then holding him in place. He’s leaning over a little awkwardly, but will stay there for hours if Jane wills it.

All too soon though, she pulls back, moves back even, putting the kitchen table between them.

‘So,’ she says, then licks her lips. Thor’s eyes drop automatically at the movement, but he waits in the distance she has created. ‘So,’ says Jane again. She sucks in a deep breath. ‘There’s a thing- that Darcy was saying- And I was thinking- What I mean is- I want to say- I really want to say-’ She breaks off and shakes her head. ‘I’m so bad at this,’ she offers with a half smile by way of apology.

‘I do not know what you are bad at?’ offers Thor, apologetic himself.

She puffs out a laugh. ‘Talking,’ she says. ‘I’d’ve thought that was obvious.’ She shrugs and he cannot help but laugh softly. ‘Anyway. Sorry. I’m- well-’ She shakes her head and squares her shoulders, and looks somewhere above his head. ‘I would like to have sex. At some point. If you want. And- more. I want us to be. Us. I want a thing. A real thing. But I have, just… so many questions. I don’t know if you do any of that on Asgard. I don’t know what it means. I don’t know if it’s biologically possible. I don’t know if you think I’m a- a- _something_ for bringing it up. Maybe- maybe you’re planning to wait until marriage? I don’t know. I assume you do marriage but I don’t even know that for certain and maybe me just asking all of this makes you think I’m crazy. I don’t know… what you want. Or- or anything, really. So can we just? Talk? Maybe?’

Thor is momentarily stunned to silence. When he finds his voice it sounds strange, untested. ‘I want whatever you want, Jane,’ he says at last. He is unsure how to answer. ‘What questions you have, I have too, but know this: I would be in your life for as long as you’ll have me.’ She looks back to him at last, and whatever she sees in his eyes stains her cheeks a faint pink so he cannot help the slow smile that spreads across his face. She is wonderful, his Jane, braver than he, that much is certain. ‘And if nothing else, perhaps I can answer this: there is no expectation on Asgard that I wait until marriage.’

At that, Jane catches his smile and sends it straight back to him, brightness and warmth holding him. ‘Well then,’ she says, biting her lip. ‘That was a good question to start your answers with.’ She walks around the kitchen table carefully, deliberately, and takes his hands. ‘I can work with that.’

She kisses him, and for a moment Thor marvels at the strength with which she directs him before giving himself over entirely.

~*~

The second night, Thor does not sleep much, not at first, although he cannot feel bad about the reason.

But then with Jane in his arms, pressed against him as though she’s never been anywhere else, he is safe enough to rest. And when he wakes with his family in his heart, there is Jane once again, promising she will be there, holding him tightly and crushing her lips to his. For the first time, Thor begins to think that maybe, just maybe, things might eventually be well again.

~*~


End file.
